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Chapter 10: Sun and Moon in One’s Sleeve

Eno said:Good friends, my teaching of the dharma takes meditation and wisdom as its basis. Never under any circumstances say mistakenly that meditation and wisdom are different; they are a unity, not two things. Meditation itself is the substance of wisdom; wisdom itself is the function of meditation. At the very moment when there is wisdom, then meditation exists in wisdom; at the very moment when there is meditation, then wisdom exists in meditation.

Good friends, this means that meditation and wisdom are alike. Students, be careful not to say that meditation gives rise to wisdom, or that wisdom gives rise to meditation, or that meditation and wisdom are different from each other.To hold this view implies that things have duality - if good is spoken while the mind is not good, meditation and wisdom will not be alike. If mind and speech are both good, then the internal and the external are the same, and meditation and wisdom are alike.

The practice of self-awakening does not lie in verbal arguments. If you argue which comes first, meditation or wisdom, you are deluded people. You won’t be able to settle the argument, and instead will cling to objective things, and will never escape from the four states of phenomena.

Eno added: Good friends, how then are meditation and wisdom alike? They are like the lamp and the light it gives forth. If there is a lamp there is light; if there is no lamp there is no light. The lamp is the substance of light; the light is the function of the lamp. Thus, although they have two names, in substance they are not two. Meditation and wisdom are also like this.

Maneesha, the understanding of mind ultimately ends in the understanding of meditation. The function of the mind is to divide things. Duality is its territory: darkness and light, life and death. The mind cannot conceive anything which has not its opposite.

But existence is not obliged to function according to the mind. In existence day and night merge into each other, every evening, every morning. They are not separate. Neither are life and death separate. If they were separate it would be possible for someone to go on living, and not to allow death to enter into his house.

An ancient Chinese story will help you to understand the great Zen master Eno. His every statement is a scripture in itself.

The ancient story is that a great emperor, being afraid of death, created a palace with a single door. No other doors, no other windows, no way of entering into the palace except from one small door where he had placed a complete row of guards. Guard number one was to be guarded by number two, and guard number two was guarded by number three, and guard number three was guarded by number four.seven guards watching each other! More protection is not possible.

A neighboring king heard about it, and he wanted to see this most secure palace. He was welcomed. The owner of the palace took him in, showed him all the facilities inside, that there was no way for any enemy, for any thief, for any killer to enter.